View source for Iota subscript

{{short description|Diacritic mark in the Greek alphabet}}

[[File:Greek iota placement 01.svg|thumb|right|160px|Iota subscripts in the word {{lang|grc|ᾠδῇ}}, ("''[[ode]]''", dative)]]

The '''iota subscript''' is a [[diacritic]] mark in the [[Greek alphabet]] shaped like a small vertical stroke or miniature [[iota]] {{angle bracket|{{lang|grc|ι}}}} placed below the letter. It can occur with the [[vowel]] letters [[eta]] {{angle bracket|{{lang|grc|η}}}}, [[omega]] {{angle bracket|ω}}, and [[alpha]] {{angle bracket|{{lang|grc|α}}}}. It represents the former presence of an {{IPA|[i]}} [[Semivowel|offglide]] after the vowel, forming a so‐called "long [[diphthong]]". Such diphthongs (i.e., {{lang|grc|ηι, ωι, ᾱι}})—phonologically distinct from the corresponding normal or "short" diphthongs (i.e., {{lang|grc|ει, οι, ᾰι}} )—were a feature of [[ancient Greek]] in the [[Archaic Greece|pre-classical]] and [[Classical Greece|classical]] eras.

The offglide was gradually lost in pronunciation, a process that started already during the classical period and continued during the [[Hellenistic period]], with the result that, from approximately the 1st century BC onwards, the former long diphthongs were no longer distinguished in pronunciation from the simple long vowels (long [[Monophthong|monophthongs]]) {{lang|grc|η, ω, ᾱ}} respectively.<ref>{{cite book |first=Roger D. |last=Woodard |title=The Ancient Languages of Europe |chapter=Attic Greek |year=2008 |place=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-139-46932-6 |page=19 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aPEENAEp938C&pg=PA19 }}</ref> 

During the [[Roman Empire|Roman]] and [[Byzantine Empire|Byzantine]] eras, the iota, now [[Silent letter|mute]], was sometimes still written as a normal letter but was often simply left out. The iota subscript was invented by [[Byzantine literature|Byzantine philologists]] in the 12th century AD as an editorial symbol marking the places where such spelling variation occurred.<ref>{{cite book|first=Bradley H.|last=McLean|year=2011|title=New Testament Greek: an introduction|place=Cambridge|publisher=Cambridge University Press|page=20}}</ref><ref name="metzger">{{cite book|first=Bruce Manning|last=Metzger|year=1981|title=Manuscripts of the Greek bible: an introduction to Greek palaeography|url=https://archive.org/details/manuscriptsgreek00bruc|url-access=limited|place=Oxford|publisher=Oxford University Press|page=[https://archive.org/details/manuscriptsgreek00bruc/page/n38 28]|isbn=978-0-19-502924-6}}</ref><ref name="Sihler">{{cite book|first=Andrew L.|last=Sihler|year=2008|title=New comparative grammar of Greek and Latin|place=Oxford|publisher=Oxford University Press|page=59}}</ref>

The alternative practice, of writing the mute iota not under, but next to the preceding vowel, is known as ''iota [[adscript]]''. In mixed-case environments, it is represented either as a slightly reduced iota (smaller than regular lowercase iota), or as a full-sized lowercase iota. In the latter case, it can be recognized as iota adscript by the fact that it never carries any diacritics (breathing marks, accents). 

In uppercase-only environments, it is represented again either as slightly reduced iota (smaller than regular lowercase iota), or as a full-sized uppercase Iota. In digital environments, and for linguistic reasons also in all other environments, the representation as a slightly reduced iota is recommended.{{By whom|date=April 2023}} There are [[Unicode]] codepoints for all Greek uppercase vowels with iota adscript (for example, {{unichar|1FBC|GREEK CAPITAL LETTER ALPHA WITH PROSGEGRAMMENI}}), allowing for easy implementation of that recommendation in digital environments.

==Terminology==

In [[Greek language|Greek]], the subscript is called {{wikt-lang|grc|ὑπογεγραμμένη}} ({{grc-transl|ὑπογεγραμμένη}}), the [[perfect (grammar)|perfect]] [[passive voice|passive]] [[participle]] form of the verb {{wikt-lang|grc|ὑπογράφω}} ({{grc-transl|ὑπογράφω}}), "to write below". Analogously, the adscript is called {{lang|grc|προσγεγραμμένη}} ({{grc-transl|προσγεγραμμένη}}), from the verb {{wikt-lang|grc|προσγράφω}} ({{grc-transl|προσγράφω}}), "to write next (to something), to add in writing".<ref>{{cite book|first=Eleanor|last=Dickey|author-link=Eleanor Dickey|year=2007|title=Ancient Greek scholarship|place=Oxford|publisher=Oxford University Press|page=256}}</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia|encyclopedia=Lexiko tis Neas Ellinikis Glossas|last=Babiniotis|first=Georgios|script-title=el:προσγράφω}}</ref>

The Greek names are [[grammatical gender|grammatically feminine]] participle forms because in medieval Greek the name of the letter [[iota]], to which they implicitly refer, was sometimes construed as a feminine noun (unlike in classical and in modern Greek, where it is neuter).<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|encyclopedia=Lexiko tis Neas Ellinikis Glossas|last=Babiniotis|first=Georgios|script-title=el:υπογράφω}}</ref> The Greek terms, transliterated according to their modern pronunciation as ''ypogegrammeni'' and ''prosgegrammeni'' respectively, were also chosen for use in character names in the computer encoding standard [[Unicode]].

As a phonological phenomenon, the original diphthongs denoted by {{angle bracket|{{lang|grc|ᾳ, ῃ, ῳ}}}} are traditionally called "long diphthongs".<ref>{{cite book|first=Donald J|last=Mastronarde|year=1993|title=Introduction to Attic Greek|url=https://archive.org/details/introductiontoat00mast|url-access=registration|place=Berkeley|publisher=University of California Press|page=9f}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Greek grammar for colleges|first=Herbert W.|last=Smyth|year=1920|place=New York|publisher=American Book Company|page=9}};</ref> They existed in the Greek language up into the classical period. From the classical period onwards, they changed to simple vowels (monophthongs), but sometimes continued to be written as diphthongs. In the medieval period, these spellings were replaced by spellings with an iota subscript, to mark former diphthongs which were no longer pronounced. In some English works these are referred to as "improper diphthongs".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Mounce|first1=William D.|title=Basics of Biblical Greek|date=November 28, 2009|publisher=Zondervan|isbn=978-0310287681|page=10|edition=3rd}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|first1=George Frederick|last1=von Ostermann|first2=Augustus E.|last2=Giegengack|title=Manual of foreign languages for the use of printers and translators|publisher=United States. Government Printing Office|year=1936|page=81}}</ref>

==Usage==
[[File:Greek iota placement 02.svg|thumb|upright=0.73|Archaizing spelling with adscripts instead of subscripts. In pre-classical times, ancient Greek had long-vowel diphthongs, which evolved into monophthongs, mostly during the classical period and after. They continued to be written as diphthongs until the medieval period, when the iota subscript was introduced, reflecting the change in pronunciation.]]
{{multiple image
   | direction = vertical
   | width     = 160
   | footer    = Different styles of treating mute iota with capital letters
   | image1    = Greek iota placement 03.svg
   | alt1      = Adscript iota after initial capital letter
   | caption1  = Titlecase
   | image2    = Greek iota placement 04.svg
   | alt2      = Full-sized capital Iota adscripts
   | image3    = Greek iota placement 05.svg
   | alt3      = lower-case iota adscripts between uppercase letters
   | image4    = Greek iota placement 06.svg
   | alt4      = subscript iota diacritics under capital letters
   | caption4  = Uppercase
  }}

The iota subscript occurs most frequently in certain [[Ancient Greek grammar|inflectional affixes of ancient Greek]], especially in the [[dative case|dative]] endings of many nominal forms (e.g. {{lang|grc|τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ, τῇ πολιτείᾳ, τῇ γλώσσῃ}}) as well as in certain verb forms of the [[subjunctive mood]] (e.g. {{lang|grc|λύσῃς, -ῃ}}). Besides these it also occurs in the roots of certain words and names, for instance {{lang|grc|ᾠδή}}, ''[[ode]]'' (and its derivatives: {{lang|grc|ᾠδεῖον}}, ''[[odeon (building)|odeon]]''; {{lang|grc|τραγῳδία}}, ''[[tragedy]]'' etc.); {{lang|grc|ᾍδης}}, ''[[Hades]]''; {{lang|grc|Θρᾴκη}}, ''[[Thrace]]''.

The rare long diphthong {{lang|grc|ῡι}} might logically have been treated the same way, and the works of [[Eustathius of Thessalonica]] provide an instance of {{lang|grc|υ}} with iota subscript (in the word {{lang|grc|ὑπόγυͅον}}),<ref>Eustathius of Thessalonica, ''Commentary on the Iliad'', III 439.</ref> but this never became the convention (the same word being spelled by other writers as {{lang|grc|ὑπόγυιον}} or {{lang|grc| ὑπόγυον}}).

The iota subscript is today considered an obligatory feature in the spelling of ancient Greek, but its usage is subject to some variation. In some modern editions of classical texts, the original pronunciation of long diphthongs is represented by the use of iota adscript, with accents and breathing marks placed on the first vowel.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Ritter |first1=R. M. |title=New Hart's Rules: The Handbook of Style for Writers and Editors |date=2005 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-165049-9 |pages=217 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3uwGtj8i_vkC&pg=PA217 |language=en}}</ref> The same is generally true for works dealing with epigraphy, paleography or other philological contexts where adherence to original historical spellings and linguistic correctness is considered important.

Different conventions exist for the treatment of subscript/adscript iota with uppercase letters. In Western printing, the most common practice is to use subscript diacritics only in lowercase environments and to use an adscript (i.e. a normal full-sized iota glyph) instead whenever the host letter is capitalized. When this happens in a mixed-case spelling environment (i.e. with only the first letter of a word capitalized, as in proper names and at the beginning of a sentence), then the adscript iota regularly takes the shape of the normal lowercase iota letter (e.g. {{lang|grc|ᾠδεῖον}} → {{lang|grc|Ὠιδεῖον}}). In an all-capitals environment, the adscript is also regularly capitalized ({{lang|grc|ΩΙΔΕΙΟΝ}}). In Greece, a more common convention is to print subscript diacritics both with lowercase and uppercase letters alike. Yet another, intermediate convention is to use lowercase adscript iotas both for mixed-case and for all-capitals words (e.g. {{lang|grc|ΩιΔΕΙΟΝ}}), or to use a special glyph in the shape of a smaller capital iota in the latter case ({{lang|grc|2=Ω<span style="font-size:65%;">Ι</span>ΔΕΙΟΝ}}).<ref name="nicholas">{{cite web|first=Nick|last=Nicholas|title=Titlecase and Adscripts|url=http://www.tlg.uci.edu/~opoudjis/unicode/unicode_adscript.html|access-date=5 August 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151026160832/http://www.tlg.uci.edu/~opoudjis/unicode/unicode_adscript.html|archive-date=26 October 2015}}</ref>

In [[modern Greek]], subscript iota was generally retained in use in the spelling of the archaizing ''[[Katharevousa]]''. It can also be found regularly in older printed [[Demotic Greek|Demotic]] in the 19th and early 20th century, but it is generally absent from the modern spelling of present-day [[Varieties of Modern Greek#Standard Modern Greek|standard Greek]]. Even when present-day Greek is spelled in the traditional polytonic system, the number of instances where a subscript could be written is much smaller than in older forms of the language, because most of its typical grammatical environments no longer occur: the old dative case is not used in modern Greek except in a few fossilized phrases (e.g. {{lang|el|ἐν τῷ μεταξύ}} "in the meantime"; {{lang|el|δόξα τῷ θεῷ}} "thank God!"), and the old spellings with {{lang|el|-ῃς/ῃ}} in subjunctive verbs have been analogically replaced by those of the indicatives with {{lang|el|-εις/-ει}} (e.g. {{lang|el|θα γράψῃς}} → {{lang|el|θα γράψεις}}). In the monotonic standard orthography, subscript iota is not used.

==Transliteration==
In [[Romanization of Greek|transliteration of Greek]] into the [[Latin alphabet]], the iota subscript is often omitted. The ''Chicago Manual of Style,'' however, recommends the iota subscript be "transliterated by an i on the line, following the vowel it is associated with (ἀνθρώπῳ, anthrṓpōi)." (11.131 in the 16th edition, 10.131 in the 15th.)

==Computer encoding==

In the [[Unicode]] standard, iota subscript is represented by a non-spacing combining diacritic character U+0345 "Combining Greek Ypogegrammeni". There is also a spacing clone of this character (U+037A, {{lang|grc|ͺ}}), as well as 36 precomposed characters, representing each of the usual combinations of iota subscript with lowercase {{lang|grc|α}}, {{lang|grc|η}} and {{lang|grc|ω}}, with and without any of the accent and breathing diacritics. In addition, for capitalized ("titlecase") use, Unicode provides a corresponding set of 27 precomposed code points with "prosgegrammeni" ({{lang|grc|ᾳ}} → {{lang|grc|ᾼ}}).<ref>The difference in number between uppercase and lowercase precomposed characters is due to the fact that there are no uppercase combinations with only an accent but no breathing mark, because such combinations do not occur in normal Greek orthography (uppercase letters with accents are used only word-initially, and word-initial vowel letters always have a breathing mark).</ref> Despite their name, which implies the use of an adscript glyph, these code points are defined as being equivalent to a combination of the base letter and the combining subscript character U+0345, just like their lowercase equivalents. They may be variously realized with either a subscript diacritic or a full-sized adscript iota glyph, depending on the font design. For use in all-capitals ("uppercase"), Unicode additionally stipulates a special case-mapping rule according to which lowercase letters should be mapped to combinations of the uppercase letter and uppercase iota ({{lang|grc|ᾳ}} → {{lang|grc|ΑΙ}}).<ref name="nicholas"/> This rule not only replaces the representation of a monophthong with that of a diphthong, but it also destroys the reversibility of any capitalization process in digital environments, as the combination of uppercase letter and uppercase iota would normally be converted back to lowercase letter and lowercase iota. It is therefore strongly recommended,{{By whom|date=April 2023}} both for the integrity of text and for the practical compatibility with digital environments, that lowercase letter and iota subscript should be capitalized in all situations and contexts as uppercase letter and iota adscript. A future revision of the above-mentioned Unicode stipulation is linguistically stipulated and digitally inevitable,{{According to whom|date=April 2023}} as its application is both destructive to the text and impractical in digital applications.

In the [[ASCII]]-based encoding standard [[Beta Code]], the iota subscript is represented by the pipe character "|" placed after the letter.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.tlg.uci.edu/encoding/|title=The beta code manual|author=Thesaurus Linguae Graecae|access-date=5 August 2012}}</ref>

==See also==
*[[Greek diacritics]]
*[[Hypodiastole]]

==References==
{{reflist|30em}}{{Navbox diacritical marks}}{{DEFAULTSORT:Iota Subscript}}
[[Category:Greek-script diacritics]]
[[Category:Greek letters]]
[[Category:Koine Greek]]